


Blast from the Past

by jenny_wren



Series: A Chaos of Sheppards [1]
Category: Inception (2010), Stargate Atlantis
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-07
Updated: 2017-07-07
Packaged: 2018-11-28 19:43:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11424855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenny_wren/pseuds/jenny_wren
Summary: John and Elizabeth are rescued by someone unexpected (I finally figured out my third Sheppard brother and Arthur's last name)





	Blast from the Past

After a year on Atlantis Elizabeth Weir was used to being terrified out of her mind, but right now she was so frightened she’d blasted way past terrified and stormed straight into boiling mad. This was not acceptable. If she was back in Pegasus, a rescue mission would already be breaking down the doors of the warehouse.

But they’re trapped on Earth and she had no faith they’d even noticed she and John were missing yet. 

The SGC had turned down John’s request for a Marine escort and she’d seen them make derogatory hand gestures indicating they thought John was a lunatic, _loopier than a fruit bat_ , was incautiously muttered close enough for her to hear. Even General O’Neill had told her to get Sheppard to tone down the crazy eyes.

They’d taken John’s guns away from him too, and his knives. Apparently he’ll get them back when he looks _less like a PTSD bomb waiting to go off_. The SGC seem to have missed the post-part of the disorder. If you’re still undergoing traumatic stress, by definition you can’t have PTSD. Currently they’re trapped off Atlantis in hostile territory with no chance of retreat, unable to call for reinforcements, unable to even call home. Elizabeth’s having fantasies of pulling a gun and demanding to be released, personally she’s amazed at John’s self-control.

Not content with stripping them of every means of protection, the SGC then tipped them out of the nominal security of the Mountain, apparently because they need to get back to normality. John had laughed at that, not his real one, but the sharply bitter one he used on missions. It made everyone watching them twitch and roll their shoulders uneasily. Elizabeth hid her smile and shifted so that she stood more firmly on John’s left and slightly in front of him, his preferred position for her when he was acting as protection detail as it allowed him to use his free right arm for attack or defense as required.

When Rodney ignored the invitation to dinner, too intent on arguing with Colonel Carter, Elizabeth could see John’s shoulders relax, although he said,

“That’s Rodney lost for the next week. Probably have to drag him back to Atlantis kicking and screaming.”

“Don’t be ridiculous Major,” snapped Rodney, suddenly surfacing from his equations and catching them all off-guard, even Colonel Carter looked surprised. Elizabeth had noticed Rodney’s awareness of his surroundings improving all the time, usually related to John. “I’m not getting stuck here. Carter is so far behind the curve on Ancient Tech I’m embarrassed for her.”

Elizabeth groaned. Of course Rodney’s tact hadn’t improved at all.

John grinned like a mischievous little boy. “Careful Rodney, I’ll start thinking you enjoyed your time on Atlantis.”

Rodney glared poisonously, “All that imminent death and disaster, how could I not?”

“I know,” John smiled rapturously and rocked happily on his heels. Elizabeth sighed because the two of them would be poking at each other even if they was bleeding out all over the floor. (She would have preferred not to have documented evidence of this, but that was Atlantis for you.)

Colonel Carter’s face twitched, “You realize it’s saying things like that that makes the base psychologists look sideways at you, Sheppard.”

“Because they’re clearly utter morons,” snarled Rodney. “Is there anyone actually qualified on staff or did they all run up their certificates with MS-Paint?”

“Rodney,” said Colonel Carter full of strained patience. “That’s not helping.”

Rodney folded his arms, “They’re making Sheppard feel bad.”

“Uh, really not,” said John.

Rodney just glowered at him, and John glowered right back. Then Teyla, who’d been taking a step back when dealing with the weird aliens at the SGC, stepped forwarded because she was more than happy to deal with team.

“John, Rodney,” she said, her tone clearly implying _not in front of the strange alien_.

“Fine,” they both mumbled and glanced at their feet.

Elizabeth once again resolved to get some sort of salary for Teyla out of the SGC.

“Come on Elizabeth,” said John. “Let’s go please our overlords. Teyla, you and Rodney should be okay with Colonel Carter, General O’Neill isn’t going to let anything happen to her, but keep an eye out anyway.”

“Yes John.” Teyla clutched for her missing P-90 then her hand slid down to hold the two short bantos rods tied to her belt. Elizabeth had successfully argued a religious exemption for her so Teyla could keep some sort of weapon with her. Of course all of them, even Rodney, had knives in their boots but Elizabeth was pretending not to know about them.

Rodney nodded too, because the three of them from Earth’d had a quiet conversation about the importance of keeping Teyla in sight of one of them at all times in case the SGC or the Trust decided to try something stupid. Teyla hadn’t even been cleared to leave the Mountain yet and Elizabeth could see John restraining himself from throwing a complete shit fit about that. Really the SGC had no idea what they were complaining about, John was being incredibly civilized all things considered.

So she and John went out together to the restaurant recommended by General O’Neill (and by recommended Elizabeth meant he suggested the place and then got Walter to make the booking for them, so really it was ordered) John gritting his teeth all the way.

Elizabeth gritted her own teeth when she ended up in a seat with a back to most of the room. She had to swivel in her chair so she could put her back to the wall. John laughed at her. They ordered too much food and then didn’t eat it. The rich creamy sauce made Elizabeth’s stomach grumble unhappily after so long without dairy and her taste for blue cheese had gone completely. John sighed,

“I miss toba root. I guess I must be pretty fucked up after all.”

Elizabeth didn’t exactly miss toba root but there would be a comforting familiarity to mashed toba root right now, it would even taste pretty decent if they mixed in some of the fried greens from Planet Mudbath.

“Me too,” she admitted

“Missing toba root, or fucked up?”

“Both, obviously.”

After pushing their food around their plates for another hour and carefully not talking about how worried they were for Atlantis, Elizabeth decided they’d been gone long enough to satisfy the SGC.

“Come on, let’s go. If we’re going to get what we want, I have a few more people to put the black on. Do you mind if I imply I could dispatch you across the world to kill them messily.”

John grinned at her, the happy grin that was just a little feral around the edges and made even the Genii pale. 

“Elizabeth, you know you can dispatch me across the world to kill them messily any time your little heart desires.”

And it was a joke but at the same time it wasn’t. She patted his arm in his thanks. 

“We should go and retrieve Rodney before he aggravates Carter to murder and I have to shoot her,” said John.

That seemed an all too likely course of events, Elizabeth hastily stood up, “Let’s go.”

 

They got grabbed as they walked into the parking lot. 

The kidnappers knew what they were doing and zatted John first, so Elizabeth had half a second to think how very, very mad John would be because he had not shut up about not having zats on Atlantis since some idiot told him about them. That their kidnappers had zats when he didn’t was just insult on top of injury.

Then of course everything was sparking blue and her body gave up on her.

 

When she blinked awake, after the momentary disorientation of finding she couldn’t lift her hands, she realized she was propped up in a lawn chair and her wrists were tapped to the arms. Another blink and the room came into focus.

John, strapped to his own lawn chair, was positioned about ten feet away from her near a bank of four computer desks. John’s eyes were closed and his body was slumped and lax but she was reasonably sure he was conscious and faking it.

At the other end of the warehouse there was a small cluster of people gathered around a table chatting. The whole thing had a weird cocktail party vibe.

Studying the group of maybe fifteen people, Elizabeth was able to classify them as the muscle, bulky in dark fatigues and deferentially quiet; the middle men, cheap suits and eager manners; and the bosses, two men and one women in very expensive suits with sleek hair and superior airs. One of the middle men was pouring glasses of wine and handing them out. There was an air of repressed excitement, as if they were waiting for the entertainment to begin.

“What’s going on?” Elizabeth demanded, not because she thought they might tell her but to divert attention from John and whatever he was planning.

“Don’t worry, nothing bad is going to happen to you,” said one of the bosses with a patronizing smirk that was surely designed to be slapped off his face. “We’re just going to ask you a few questions.”

“Which we’re not going to answer,” said John abruptly ‘waking up’. Somehow he managed to sound relaxed and unbothered by the entire ordeal, as if they were lounging about on a beach.

Elizabeth just tried not to wince too obviously. While she had confidence John could hold out, she had no such faith in herself. With an effort she tried to pull together the training John and his Marines had given the civilians on how to deal with being interrogated.

The man in the suit laughed, “We’ve brought in a couple of experts for you. Only the best for our two star guests. I hear they’re fascinating to watch.”

Trapped between fury and terror, Elizabeth tried to curl up her body around her roiling stomach. John was set his jaw,

“John Sheppard, Major,” and then he rattled off his serial number. 

The man laughed, “Oh you are going to be fun.”

John repeated his name, rank and number. Elizabeth stared, hardly believing this was really happening.

“They’ve arrived,” said the woman, “Marcus stop antagonizing our guests and come introduce me. I’ve been looking forward to this.” She all but wiggled with anticipation.

“Of course Kathryn.”

The ripple of excitement that coiled through the room was exactly the same as when some showbiz celebrity arrived at a diplomatic function, prurient interest and at the same time a sense of superiority because this was the hired help.

The door opened and another two body guard types entered ushering in a slim, precise young man in a smart suit talking to yet another boss type. This boss was older and blandly corporate but with the dead eyes of a shark. The young man seemed appropriately wary, his voice low and respectful,

“Now when it comes to information gathering, we can’t guarantee results, of course, but we have had – ”

It was all said so blandly as if it was a simple consulting job he was discussing and not her and John’s torture. He was carrying a small silver suitcase and Elizabeth tried hard not to imagine what might be inside it. John’s entire body had locked up and his face was almost unrecognizable in its bleak harshness.

“ – some very satisfactory outcomes. You should have –

A second bigger man followed him, almost the bodyguard type but with a sharp foxy intelligence. He shook hands with one of the bosses, then kissed the back of the woman’s hand with a flourish.

“– received several testimonials – ”

The slim young man abruptly stopped talking and froze in place for a second like a jerky reel of film; then he was diving forward in a roll coming up in a crouch at Elizabeth’s side. He had a gun in his hand now and bullets were firing.

Elizabeth’s mouth was open, scream strangled in her throat with shock.

The bigger man yelled, “What the hell are you playing at?” even as he tightened his grip on the hand he was shaking, yanking the man towards him and slamming his forehead into the bridge of the man’s nose sending blood splurting everywhere,

“Some sodding warning would be nice,” he complained, as he spun his victim around to act as a shield and drew his own gun.

“Hey,” exclaimed the slim young man, he dropped his gun as bullets ran out and drew another, “I walked into Lusaka cold.”

“That was not my fault.”

“Whose fault was it then?”

“Alright it was a teeny bit my fault.” The bigger man was now crouched behind the computer desks as he paused to jam another clip in his gun.

“It was entirely your fault.”

Elizabeth listened to the surreal argument as her eyes watched the bodies hit the floor. The bodyguards had all gone down in the first wave of shots. The middle men were staring and stunned and Elizabeth experienced a weird stab of fellow feeling for them, she couldn’t believe it was happening either. The woman scrabbled for one of the bodyguard’s guns but collapsed with a bubbling red mess where her throat used to be.

Abruptly as it started it was over and the guns fell silent. 

“Ugh,” the bigger man stood up, shook himself out, and started to check the bodies with swift kicks, looking for a reaction. 

“You cannot possibly hold Lusaka against me for the rest of our lives,” he grumbled, having apparently given up trying to disclaim responsibility.

“Wanna bet?” demanded the slim young man. Elizabeth would not take that bet. The other man didn’t seem likely to either, he snorted,

“And anyway, what the bloody hell was all that about? You said we couldn’t risk screwing around on this job. That it might be interesting but they were more than likely going to try and have us killed afterwards. Well I have news for you, they’re definitely going to kill us now, darling.”

“Not,” said darling, as he put another bullet into a not-yet corpse, “if they don’t find out what happened.”

The bigger man was not appeased and continued as if darling hadn’t spoken, 

“And all for _her_.” 

A glare of scorching dislike made Elizabeth flinch, alarmed at suddenly being dragged into the argument. While she had no fondness for their previous captors, they appeared to have been exchanged for a considerably more trigger-happy set. 

Even with the threat of torture she thought she might prefer the previous lot because at least they wanted something from them, which opened things up for negotiation. And if there was negotiation then you had the opportunity to work towards a mutually beneficial solution.

Darling’s face curled into a sneer, “Not for her.” And yes most of Elizabeth was thoroughly glad to be so dismissed at the same time a tiny part of her was contradictorily offended at the dismissal. 

“I’ve never seen her before in my life.” That he’d never wanted to was strongly implied.

Ignoring Elizabeth he stalked across the room to where John lay trapped under his chair. Somehow when the shooting started John, unable to protect himself any other way, had managed to fling himself sideways, flipping the chair and landing on the floor under its meagre protection. 

Darling produced a flick knife and Elizabeth had a second of pure terror before she realized he was slicing through the tape on John’s wrists, not John himself. That left the big guy glaring at the ceiling,

“Fine, leave me to do all the work.” A knife appeared in his own hands and he crouched by Elizabeth and started to saw through her bonds.

“Don’t strain yourself,” said darling. “If she gives you any trouble, I’ve got more tape in the bag.”

Elizabeth made some sort of sound. The big guy smiled at her with practiced charm,

“Don’t mind Arthur. His bark is worse than his bite.”

“It is not,” snapped darling Arthur. 

The big guy sighed, “True, your bite would give people rabies – but I was trying to be reassuring.”

“Why?” Arthur sounded confused about the whole idea.

“Why? So she doesn’t start wailing like a banshee.”

“Tape in bag.”

“You have the manners of a troll.”

“You knew that already.”

“A grumpy troll,” he muttered, but Arthur, grunting with success as he cut John loose, ignored him. The chair was tossed aside and then Arthur yanked John to his feet. Elizabeth was surprised he managed it so easily, he must be like John, tougher than he looked.

John slouched back, one hip cocked, “I suppose you expect me to say thank you,” he said at his most truculent.

Elizabeth had a flash of fellow feeling for the big guy who was also stuck dealing with someone who enjoyed being difficult. Arthur didn’t appear to notice though, he turned on his companion,

“Eames have you finished flirting yet?”

“I am not flirting,” said the big guy. He glanced back at Elizabeth, “I promise I am much smoother at flirting. You would know if I was flirting with you.”

“I’m sure I would,” said Elizabeth, because she thought ‘please go away and take your homicidal maniac with you’ would be undiplomatic.

“As I said, if you’ve quite finished flirting, you can get into the computer and kill the recordings.”

Eames heaved the sigh of the put upon and downtrodden,

“As you know I will perform miracles before breakfast for you darling. I just wish I knew – ” he broke off as he got his first good look at John, double-taked, and then looked John up and down leisurely and with distaste.

“ – or I could break a few bones for you instead?”

Arthur flushed with pleasure but he snapped, “Recordings, now.”

With another long look at John, Eames did as he was instructed.

Elizabeth gritted her teeth, she disliked little more than being the person in the room who had no idea what was going on. She also felt someone should take charge of the situation.

What is going on?” she demanded.

Everyone ignored her. Eames was focused on the computer setup. Arthur began to drag the dead bodies about the room. Elizabeth couldn’t determine his purpose but John joined him and they worked silently but with obvious co-ordination until they were both satisfied.

Arthur opened his briefcase and withdrew what Elizabeth recognized, with a sinking sense of inevitably, as a block of plastic explosive. John reached out to take it from him, and Arthur yanked it back. John pulled a face,

“Give me that,” he grabbed for explosives again.

Eames appeared on silent feet, body-checked John, and shoved his gun up in John’s face,

“You should remember,” he said with glacial cold, “that I would _enjoy_ putting a bullet in your head.”

“Jesus,” swore John. “What the hell have you being telling your friends about me?”

Arthur kept on blanking him. Instead he shoved Eames’ gun arm down and said,

“Fuck. Calm down. I didn’t go to all this trouble just so you could shoot him.”

Eames shrugged his shoulders, “Offers open.” He holstered his gun and went back to fixing up the computers. Arthur still didn’t say anything to John, just took the disputed explosives and started to wire the room.

“I really think – ” John began.

Eames drew his gun and put two bullets in the wall, one either side of John.

“I think we just need to wait it out,” said Elizabeth quickly, crossing the room to link her arm with John’s. “I’m sure your friends have it all under control.”

“We are _not_ friends,” said Arthur. He turned to Eames, “Aren’t you done yet?”

“Did you want to do this?”

“Sorry,” muttered Arthur.

“’s okay. Anyway, they were on a closed loop so I’ve killed all the footage. It would be better if we had time to pull the motherboards – ”

Arthur flung him a lump of explosive,

“ – or that works too.”

Elizabeth could feel John’s body locking up and his face was freezing blank and empty. She wondered if she should be worrying. Since darling Arthur had recognized John, and John had recognized him, she had presumed they had been rescued but now she wasn’t so sure. Eames was clearly willing to shoot both her and John and call it done. But it was Arthur who was calling the shots. If only his blank face wasn’t as remote and inscrutable as John’s

Wiring the place obviously complete, the two men met in the middle of the room. Their conversation was too low for Elizabeth to make out the words but the tone was that of a brief check-in. Then Eames nodded and strode away.

“Alright,” said Arthur, directing his words at Elizabeth, “Eames is going to bring the car around. You are going to be blind-folded.” He held out two ties taken from the dead men. One of them was stained red. Elizabeth left that one for John. “You don’t have to wear them as blindfolds but knot them around your necks as if they were.”

“So you want us to claim we didn’t see anything,” said John knotting his tie in place. It left dirty brown smudges on his fingers. Elizabeth imitated him, the silk slippery against her skin as her hands trembled under the growing tension in the room, because Arthur said nothing and continued to ignore John.

“C’mon,” said John with that aggravating cockiness that made superior officers and would-be warlords want to punch him. “You want us to go along with your plan, you’re actually going to have to speak to me _Arthur_.”

Arthur’s fist clenched and then relaxed. “Fine,” his voice was clipped, like John reporting to Everett, Arthur had to be ex-military. “It would be significantly easier for us if you claimed to have seen nothing and know nothing. However as our welfare is of no particular concern to you, I would hesitate to direct you in any fashion.”

Elizabeth coughed to hide her snort. It was more words than John would have used, but the slight tilt of chin to drive home the ‘go die in a fire’ message was all him. 

John rocked back on his heels as if he’d taken a punch after all. When he turned his head his eyes were as remote and cold as the black emptiness of space. Elizabeth shivered, no longer sure of who she should be more afraid.

Arthur’s head snapped round, “I can hear the car. Wheels up.” He stalked away without any indication he expected or wanted them to follow him.

Face very grim, John curled his arm around her shoulders an ushered her along. Elizabeth stayed quiet, aware that any words, not matter how seemingly innocent, could set off the explosion.

Outside the warehouse Eames was indeed ready and waiting beside the smooth black car, the sort the villains drove in movies. Elizabeth smiled at him, grateful for someone who could break the ominous intensity between the two dark bookends. He patted her shoulder and opened the back door, bundling John and her inside and then climbing in after them.

Arthur swung himself into the driver’s seat, slammed the door and slammed his foot down. They screeched away, until Arthur yanked on the handbrake and sent them spinning into a perfect bootlegger’s turn and Elizabeth was irresistibly reminded of John’s ability to convince a plane to defy the laws of physics for him.

Eames leaned forward to put his hand on Arthur’s shoulder. John braced one arm against the door and the other tightened around Elizabeth like a steel band. Something clicked loudly in the breathy silence – and the warehouse exploded in a blast of light and fury.

Elizabeth blinked furiously trying to clear the dark shadows dancing in front of her eyes. The warehouse had collapsed into a mess of rubble and flames.

“It’s caught,” said Eames. “Let’s go.”

Arthur nodded, his foot thudded to the floor and they zipped away. The car flew rapidly back to the center of Colorado Springs and Elizabeth was starting to recognize the streets when the car skidded to a stop, Eames leaned across them to open the door and then she and John where being shoved out into the street.

Behind them the car screeched away as people started to run towards them from the nearby bars, “Are you alright, sir? ma’am?” fading rapidly into “Good God, Dr Weir,” and “Major Sheppard, what happened?” “Dr Weir, do you need an ambulance?”

They were whisked back to the Mountain almost before Elizabeth could draw breath. The medics got them first, though they seemed far less interested in possible injuries than in getting them both into an MRI scanner to check they hadn’t been snaked. It wasn’t something Elizabeth could exactly object to, but she couldn’t help feeling the contrast to Atlantis, where they’d at least be pleased they were still alive instead of annoyed about the increased workload.

Then she was in front of General O’Neill at his most lazily distracted so she firmed up her game face and went with the zatted, blind-folded, know nothing story and when he pressed referred him to John as her Head of Security. That got her a look and then she was left alone with a sympathetic Daniel and a cup of chamomile tea for shock.

Elizabeth was rather affronted that they thought she was too stupid to recognize a second interrogation when it presented itself. She stuck to her story and even managed to squeeze out a tear or two, mostly out of sheer frustration, but still – watery eyes.

They didn’t let up even then, Sam Carter appeared to show her down to the rooms they were using in the Mountain. So Elizabeth gritted her teeth, tolerated the hug and pretended she was shaking from nerves and not annoyance.

They met John on the way to the quarters they shared with Rodney and Teyla. He was walking with Colonel Mitchell and talking about football scores. He looked relaxed if you ignored the animal flat eyes.

The suite they were in had four bedrooms and two baths branching off a small common room. It wasn’t fancy but it was clean and comfortable. They’d all have liked it a lot better if there wasn’t only one door that needed be locked to keep them in.

Rodney and Teyla looked up as they walked in.

“John, Elizabeth, I am pleased to see you well,” said Teyla with a restrained nod of her head. The Athosian forehead greeting had been dropped by the team without comment to Elizabeth once they arrived on Earth.

“You Military-people going to give Sheppard back his guns now?” snapped Rodney.

“That’s, uh, under discussion,” said Mitchell, glancing at Sam for help.

“We’ll leave you to get settled,” said Sam. “There’ll be a briefing tomorrow at nine.”

“Oh goody,” said John. “Another briefing.”

Mitchell was about to say something, then visibly reconsidered. He started to back out the room, keeping himself slightly in front of Sam, between her and the possible threat. Sam gave the impression of being oblivious to this maneuver.

“Sleep well,” she said.

“Goodnight Colonel Carter,” said Teyla. Elizabeth smiled, or possibly grimaced she was a bit too numb to tell, and nodded. Mitchell and Sam left.

“Well fuck,” said John and collapsed back onto one of the sofas, swinging his legs up so he could rest his boots on the arm.

“What the hell happened?” demanded Rodney.

Elizabeth glanced up at the celling and the probable bugs.

“Oh don’t worry about it,” said Rodney. “I’ve got those buzzy debuggers in place. They won’t be able to pick anything up. And they can’t tell me to stop using them without admitting they’re bugging us, which they’re not going to do.”

“So what happened?” asked Teyla. “The reports we received were unclear.”

“We’re fucking fine,” said John. 

Rodney’s face twitched like it did when he was figuring out the errors in an equation.

“You don’t swear, Sheppard. What the hell is going on?”

John didn’t say anything. Elizabeth was going to scream in frustration. She quickly ran through the little she knew. Teyla’s face grew anxious and she moved to sit on the sofa by John, shoving at his legs until he made space for her.

“John,” she took his hand in hers. “Was Arthur an old friend of yours?”

“Apparently not.”

“John?”

John sighed. “Rodney, you’ve hacked my records.”

“What? No, of course I… Okay fine, obviously I did, but I wouldn’t have to if you ever said anything.”

“Right, so you know about my family.”

“Yes, your father is Patrick Sheppard, I consulted for Sheppard Industries once, they weren’t entirely stupid. And you have an older brother, David, he looks rather boring for somebody who’s your brother.”

“Well I used to have a younger brother.”

“Oh my God,” said Elizabeth, as she remembered how much Arthur had reminded her of John.

“Mark followed me into the Military. Made first Lieutenant in the Army. Joined a Special Project team. He was killed in action five years ago, they never found his body. My father never spoke to me again.” That was said without rancor, as if John would have stopped speaking to himself too if he could only have managed it.

“Oh my God,” said Elizabeth again. “Of course Arthur is your brother. He was exactly like you.”

“So your brother, he is this Arthur who helped you. He is alive. John this is wonderful news.” Teyla leaned forward to place her hand on John’s arm.

John ignored her to look over at Elizabeth, “Did Mark – _Arthur_ – sound like he thought it was wonderful news?”

“Not exactly,” she admitted.

“His friend was going to shoot me.” John closed his eyes as if he considered the conversation over.

“But surely he was glad to see you,” Teyla objected, eyes wide with distress.

Elizabeth coughed, “He is related to John, Teyla. Even if he was glad, nobody would be able to tell. And he was glad, John. Or at any rate, he didn’t let his friend shoot you, did he?”

Rodney snorted with laughter.

“Rodney,” Teyla scolded.

“I’m sorry,” said Rodney, “it’s just – he didn’t let his friend shoot you – that’s Sheppardian affection right there. Definitely related. Tell me more about Arthur-Mark.”

John shrugged his whole body, “Not much to say.”

“But John, he is your brother,” Teyla protested.

“Hmm,” said Rodney as his fingers danced over his laptop keyboard. “His service record is even more ridiculously redacted than yours Sheppard. Here we go, Project Somnacin.”

Elizabeth stared, “I heard of that, it was a bit of scandal. It was shut down by the Ethics committee, which just never happens to a live project.”

“Cor-rrect,” said Rodney. “If by ‘shut down’ you mean ‘driven underground’. So let’s see. Huh. Well that’s just stupid. No project would have a hundred percent mortality rate, test subjects and researchers alike. Somebody was covering this up very badly. Hmm.”

“What does it matter,” said John. “He’s the one who stayed away. And he was mad as hell. Mark couldn’t have made his position clearer.”

“Indeed,” said Teyla. “He was hired to work for your enemy, but on realizing they were holding you prisoner he acted immediately to break you out at considerable risk to himself.”

“Well you put it like that.” John opened his eyes and actually sat up a little.

“Yes,” Elizabeth agreed, “As soon as he recognized you he jumped right with barely a first thought, let alone a second.”

“Yeah.” John had almost sat up when he suddenly slumped back. “He’s working for the Trust. They brought him in to make us talk.” 

“Yes,” said Elizabeth, because she’d been there for that, and frankly she was enormously grateful John’s brother had ended up working for the Trust. Of course telling John that wouldn’t help, he’d only find something else to mope about. Instead she said,

“He was working for the Trust. And he resigned with explosives. Once they catch up with him they’ll put a bullet in his head – if he’s lucky. He won’t be a problem for long.”

John was up off the couch so fast he’d have knocked Teyla flying if she wasn’t already smiling quietly and dodging out his way.

“Rodney!” he yelped. “Get on that computer and find my brother.”

Rodney grinned back at him, “One impossible thing done faster than humanly possible coming right up.”


End file.
